Stressing about conversation with parents over uBPD sis

[moglow]

Like anyone else - she doesn't have to say why she's asking. My guess is she's preparing her arguments for when she manages to force that conversation on others. It's still need to know information and you're under no obligation to play along with it, however casually approached. Providing her with any information regarding your life allows her an opening to conversations you're not interested in having. Politely change the subject and she can sit in that.

[bloomie]

Τhe problem is she won't say why she's asking the questions. It makes it sounds like it's casual conversation (it never is) so if I refuse to reply it sounds rude. I just said 'not sure how many days I've got, yeah the job is flexible'. It still annoys me though.

So annoying when you know in your knower there is an undercurrent of info gathering to sabotage or divide, compete or compare. When you know anything you say can and will be used against you in some kind twist it is a colossal waste of our time and energy, isn't it? Grrrr....

It seems like you handled this very well with a vague answer. Let your sister build whatever mountain of dirty tricks she may be building and trying to climb. You are building a toolset and confidence in your ability to move through it with strength, dignity, and a firm refusal to engage. Move through those feelings and do not allow them to derail you. In time, I believe you will have little to no emotional reaction to the nonsense. You will recognize it, use your strategies, and be

[walking on broken glass]

In time, I believe you will have little to no emotional reaction to the nonsense. You will recognize it, use your strategies, and be
[/quote]

I really hope you are right! It hasn't happened so far.

Like anyone else - she doesn't have to say why she's asking.

I know she doesn't have to say why she is asking. It is that, with other people, the conversation flows and is less of an interrogation: there is a to and fro, a mutual exchange of information, and when they ask questions you don't have to guess why, it's pretty obvious. With sis it's never the case because she always has sinister motives and her questions are camouflaged as innocent interest. So if I go 'why are you asking?' she will pretend to be offended that I thought she was intrusive. This is why I normally try to respond in a disengaged way: to keep her appeased but not give her what she wants! Changing the subject is also a good tactic 

[Sheppane]

Ugh. I hate this sort of thing. When you know there is an agenda to the questioning. When you know it will be put on a scorecard in the future or even not spoken about at all but just adds to the steaming pile of toxicity.

You know this is not normal. As you said in normal relationships this doesn't happen there is a mutual exchange of info, an easy flow. My T once said my FOO operate by stealth- finding information, filing it, building resentments etc. I think that's quite common in these families and a lot of people here probably recognize the pattern.

So ....what I find useful is  firstly ask myself why I am surprised- this is X doing what they do. Here we go again. You could write the script.  You may also feel triggered as you actually suspected to get some sort of pushback like this after offering to help - either overtly or covertly.  And tada  here it is ! ! IME when I know something is about to kick off, and then it does, it has the power to send me into a tailspin. The huge frustration too. I used to spend a lot of energy thinking how do I respond to this ? What do I say ? If I say this shell think this if I say that it'll look like that?  Now I just don't bother. The freedom lies in disengaging. That's where the power is.

I find naming it as a pattern  " sis doing the make me feel guilty dance ( or whatever the dance of the day is) " helps. I try and drop the story line / narrative that goes around in my head about it. Though that's hard sometimes. I guess what I'm trying to say is see this for the rubbish it is and calmly step away to focus on yourself.

I think you had this reaction to her questioning is because you know there is a sinister undercurrent. Normally if people ask us questions without thay sort of undercurrent we dont feel anything. Its crystal clean. But this is one large hook to drag you into an icky swamp of overexplaining, justifying your leave, possibly even some victim martyrdom too ( she can't come as she doesn't have enough days ) , and yes now you will be doing something kind and supportive for your parents which knocks someone else off the golden child pedestal possibly?

Anyway, you didn't take the bait, so we'll done